1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to third party verification services. Such services can be used, among other things, to confirm a customer""s intent to buy a product or service.
2. Background of the Related Art
There are many instances when a vendor of goods and services must obtain independent third party verification of a customer""s intent to purchase goods and services, and/or that the customer is empowered to enter into the transaction. One common example is where a customer agrees to switch from one long distance telephone service provider to another. Under current FCC regulations, a long distance telephone service provider who convinces a customer to switch must obtain proof that the customer is authorized to make the switch, and that the customer desires the switch. One common way of obtaining this proof is to obtain independent third party verification of the customer""s intent and authorization to make the switch.
Currently, several companies provide the independent third party verification service to the seller""s of goods and services. Typically, the independent verification service provider will employ many live telephone operators who perform the verification process. A description of how a typical independent verification process works, in connection with a switch of long distance telephone service providers, is provided below.
To begin, a sales agent of a long distance telephone service provider will call a customer who is currently using a different long distance service provider, and the sales agent will attempt to convince the customer to switch service providers. If the sales agent is successful, the sales agent will then pass the customer off to a live operator at the independent third party verification service. In some instances, the sales agent may provide the live operator at the independent verification service with some customer-specific information, such as the customer""s telephone number, name, address and social security number. The sales agent will then terminate his connection with the customer and with the independent verification service.
The live operator at the independent verification service will then ask the customer a series of questions to verify that the customer desires to make the switch to a new service provider, that the customer is empowered to make the switch, and in some instances, to verify that the customer understands the terms of the new service agreement. The customer""s oral responses to the operator""s questions are recorded to provide proof that the customer authorized the switch to the new telephone service provider.
The independent third party verification service is relatively expensive for the telephone service providers. The high cost of the independent verification service is due to the need to pay a significant number of live operators to perform the service, thus ensuring that enough live operators are standing by to handle all the verification needs for the sales agents.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an independent third party verification service which is less expensive than a system using live operators for customer interaction.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a system and method which achieves a high degree of accuracy in performing the independent verification process.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide automated remote access to recorded customer responses.
In a system and method embodying the present invention, after a sales agent sells goods or services to a customer, the sales agent will engage an automated independent verification service. The automated system is used to pose one or more questions to a customer, and to automatically record the customer""s responses to those questions. The automated system can use a voice synthesizer or pre-recorded sounds to create appropriate questions. The customer""s responses can be oral responses, and voice recognition software can be used to analyze and interpret the oral responses. During or after the customer questioning process, the system can create an automated score of customer responses which provides an indication of whether the customer has agreed to purchase the goods and services, and possibly whether the customer is authorized to enter into the transaction.
With an automated system embodying the present invention, a large number of automated customer verification calls can be conducted without the need for live operator intervention. If it is desirable, to increase the accuracy of the verification process, the recorded customer responses can be reviewed by a live operator to verify that the automated score (indicating the customer""s intent and authorization) is accurate.
Because the customer interaction is completely automated, the live operator can conduct a review of customer responses at any time. A large number of customer responses can be stored in a memory device of the system, and all the responses can be reviewed at one time to maximize the effectiveness of the live operator""s review time. Also, because the live operator need only review the customer responses to the questions posed by the system, and not the questions, the amount of time required for the live operator to review customer responses is minimized.
After reviewing each series of customer responses, the live operator can generate an operator score, which is also indicative of the customer""s intent and/or authorization to purchase goods and services. The system could then automatically compare the operator""s score to the automated score as a second check of the automated score. This serves to increase the accuracy of the verification process.
Because a live operator need only review the customer responses to questions posed by the automated system, and because there is no dead time between verification calls, the amount of live operator time required to perform the verification process is greatly reduced compared to prior art independent verification services. This helps to reduce the cost of the independent verification service. In addition, because the operator""s score of the customer responses can be compared to an automated score created by the system, the accuracy of the independent verification process is increased.
Additional advantages, objects, and features of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows and in part will become apparent to those having ordinary skill in the art upon examination of the following, or may be learned from practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained as particularly pointed out in the appended claims.